Opening Government in London – Media, Recap, and More

Our London meeting was a huge success, drawing in participants from across our pre-Network and beyond. At 10 Downing Street, our conversations tackled the major shifts in governance being enabled by new technologies – a dialogue whose highlights were captured on Twitter as well as in photographs (slideshow below). The following day, at the Open Data Institute, we began drilling down on specific projects and problems – plantings the seeds of what will grow into the foundations of our potential research and project agenda. After the jump, we’ve posted a presentation summarizing the major shift in the relationship between government and citizens we discussed at No. 10, as well as a few interesting responses from pre-Network members. For another look at that shift, download our one-page summary that poses some of the toughest questions of our work.

“I also want us to think about things outside of the boundaries of the traditional nation-state. I really want to see day when community organizer in Southern London can communicate with community organizer in India on common issues. Technological underpinnings imply drastic rethinking of the traditional boundaries between governments and nation-states.”

“The most interesting data is not the government data, it’s the data of citizens. Net recommended scores and experience of users tend to be of much larger value. Official data is really more about calibrating.”

“We’re at a point of fierce urgency of now. It’s not clear how much government is actually changing, if lives are actually being changed…. but we run the risk of having these developments not be seen to actually change lives. Are they actually adding to a rich democratic, national relationships around the world, or, is technology and open data sometimes used as a screen to allow the same five guys to make the same decisions they’ve always been making?”